The English Utopias I.Early Modern Fantasies

The Birth of English Utopia: Thomas MoreUtopia and Travel Literature: Joseph Hall’s Mundus…

EditionsThe first five editions of More’s Utopia came out in Louvain, Paris, Basel and Florence from 1516 to 1519; there was no printing of the Latin original in England until 1663 and Scotland until 1750; of More’s Latin writings, only his Epistola ad Brixium in 1520 and his Responsio ad Lutherum in 1523 (twice) issued from an English press.

Lotte Hellinga and J. B. Trapp eds. The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain Vol. III. 1400-1557 (Cambridge: CUP, 1999), 290.

Editions/Translations

Balázs Mihály, „Thomas Morus és Jacobus Palaeologus,” in Boros Gábor szerk., Reneszánsz Filozófia (Budapest: NMFT, Tudástársadalom Alapítvány, 2009), 113-134. (NMFT Közlemények 4., Világosság-könyvek 4.)

1516 Louvain1517 Paris1518 Basel

1524 Basel, German translation (only Book II)

1548 Venice, Italian translation (Italy-criticism)

1551 Paris, French translation1559 Lyon, French translation1585 Paris, French translation of Book II only

BM: Suppressing of poliphony;

no place for a religion based on reason

Title Page – Louvain edition

Utopian Alphabet

Abraham Ortelius (1527-1598)

Interpretation• collaboration among intellectual friends (letters, verse)• a mixture of serious issues + comedy (satire)• More’s hope that U. would be published with testimonials from those in public office (not only literators)• many ambiguities, different strategies of reconciliation

chatolic martyr divorce, married clergy, toleration

• biographical approach – “not a path recommended by the text’s best critics”• question of anachronism – questions arising from ideological developments after More

InterpretationG. Logan: U. as a “best commonwealth exercise”, following the philosophical tradition of Plato, Aristotle

Grace:• L. suppresses the similarities between U. and England• restricts the humorous, playful side of the work• some readers can downplay the aspect of political theory (C. S. Lewis)• a dialogue with the reader – closer to Cicero’s handling of philosophical texts

InterpretationJ. H. Hexter: Utopia is on the margins of modernity because of the attitude behind it (not the details).• plasticity, corrigibility of human nature• basis of More’s political theory: public law, common action

Dominic Baker-Smith: the absence of responsibility.• no room for the will, no privacy to exercise it• no names except Utopus• similar to Sparta• responsibility in the Utopians’ rationality (through instruction and good books)

InterpretationE. Nelson: More’s Utopia versus Macchiavelli’s The Prince: struggle between Roman republican values and Greek ethics.

For the best critics, it is a questioning of conventional thought, against the blind acceptance of established forms

Book 1 – pride private propertyBook 2 –

InterpretationHexter:“It would take too long to repeat all that Raphael told us he had observed in each place, now would it serve our present purpose. Perhaps on another occasion we shall tell more about these things, especially those that it woul be useful not to be ignorant of – above all, the wise and prudent provisions that he observed among the civilised nations. (…) While he told us of many ill-considered usages in these new-found nations, he also described quite a few other customs, from which our own citiesm nations, races and kingdoms might take lessons in order to correct their errors. These I shall discuss in another place, as I said.”

Interpretation• utilitarianism on an Epicurean basis• “equal right of all to pleasure”• different interpretations of pleasure (Valla – More)• experience without opinion – Epicurean ideal• book 1 – examples of judgment distorted by opinion Morton: importance of experience

“[Cardinal:] It is not easy to guess whether this scheme would work well or not, since it has never been tried. (…) [Hythloday:] When the Cardinal had said this, they all vied with one another in praising enthusiastically ideas which they had received with contempt when I suggested them,”

InterpretationGrace’s conclusion

“Utopia shapes the humanist intellectual inheritance into the scaffolding for a critique and a novel approach to reform. If it does not put that reform in programmatic terms, it does challenge its readers to think beyond conventional politics in imagining a society that takes the equal claims of all to happiness as a serious matter for government.”

Ortelius’ World Map

Hall

Hall